Apple's investors are unloading shares over news that the company has cut iPhone 5 component orders in half due to weaker-than-expected demand for its new smartphone. That came just weeks after UBS analyst Steven Milunovich cut his iPhone sales estimates by 5 million units in three 2013 quarters, saying that Apple would face increasing trouble selling both its smartphones and tablets.

I wonder if somebody is making a killing shorting Apple stock.
At $500-plus, even a 3% drop is going to be good money for rumormongers.

I don't think Tim Cook & Co. are laughing very much over this. The info appears to be legit. The sources seem to be coming out of Japan, directly from Apple's LCD manufacturers -- Sharp, LG, and Japan Display:

Quote:

The iPhone maker has almost halved its order of liquid-crystal display panels from key suppliers, according to the Japanese newspaper the Nikkei.

Apple has told three suppliers, Japan Display, Sharp and LG Display, that it requires fewer screens, after previously requesting as many as 65 million units for the January to March quarter. Japan Display’s plant in Nomi, a key iPhone supplier, is expected to reduce output temporarily by between 70% and 80%, compared with the October to December period.

I was watching an analyst on CNBC telling us because they only sold 50 million iPhones in the 4th quarter investors are shorting the stock.

50 million would make it Apple's best quarter ever for iPhone sales.
Last quarter they sold 26.9 million iPhones. The best quarter was 2012Q1 with 37 million.
(The next figures released will be Apple's 2013Q1, their 2012Q4 ended in October.)